14-02-2013, 10:24 AM
WHAT IS AN APPLICATION PLATFORM?
[attachment=50803]
INTRODUCTION
Just about every application today relies on other software: operating systems, database management software, even software running in the public cloud. Whatever it does and wherever it runs, all of this software together comprises an application platform.
Application platforms play a fundamental role in modern computing environments. Applications and the data they use provide all of the value that information technology brings, and virtually every application depends on an application platform. Since pretty much every organization today relies on applications, there’s a clear connection between business value and application platforms1.
Yet modern application platforms aren’t simple. The applications they support run on all kinds of computers, including mobile phones, desktops, on-premises servers, and servers in the public cloud. An effective application platform needs to provide the right set of services on each of these. And different kinds of applications need different things from an application platform. A single-user application running on a phone needs radically different services for execution and storage than does an application that runs in the cloud and supports thousands of simultaneous users. Thinking clearly about all of this diversity requires taking a broad view of application platforms, whatever services they provide and wherever they run.
The goal of this paper is to provide that broad view. We’ll start with a general look at the topic, building an abstract model, then end with a specific example: the Microsoft application platform. Before doing any of this, however, we first need to examine the things that every application platform supports: applications themselves.
What is an Application?
By definition, an application platform provides services to applications. But what exactly is an application? This isn’t a simple question to answer, and reasonable people can disagree on a precise definition. Still, it’s not hard to illustrate typical application styles, and doing this gives us a good sense of the diversity that an application platform must support today. Figure 1 shows the simplest place to start: a standalone application running on a client computer.
Describing Application Platforms: An Abstract View
Applications come in several different styles, as we’ve just seen, and an application platform should support all of them. This is a tall order: Diverse services are required, and they must be provided in various ways. One way to understand this complexity is first to group together the kinds of services an application platform provides, then look at the different contexts in which those groups of services are provided. Figure 5 illustrates the fundamental service groups of a modern application platform.
Conclusion
Twenty five years ago, application platforms were simple: an IBM mainframe offered CICS while a desktop PC provided a basic operating system. Today, both the hardware and software environments have expanded significantly, and developers have many more options. This requires them to understand a more complex world, but it also lets them create a much broader array of useful applications.
[attachment=50803]
INTRODUCTION
Just about every application today relies on other software: operating systems, database management software, even software running in the public cloud. Whatever it does and wherever it runs, all of this software together comprises an application platform.
Application platforms play a fundamental role in modern computing environments. Applications and the data they use provide all of the value that information technology brings, and virtually every application depends on an application platform. Since pretty much every organization today relies on applications, there’s a clear connection between business value and application platforms1.
Yet modern application platforms aren’t simple. The applications they support run on all kinds of computers, including mobile phones, desktops, on-premises servers, and servers in the public cloud. An effective application platform needs to provide the right set of services on each of these. And different kinds of applications need different things from an application platform. A single-user application running on a phone needs radically different services for execution and storage than does an application that runs in the cloud and supports thousands of simultaneous users. Thinking clearly about all of this diversity requires taking a broad view of application platforms, whatever services they provide and wherever they run.
The goal of this paper is to provide that broad view. We’ll start with a general look at the topic, building an abstract model, then end with a specific example: the Microsoft application platform. Before doing any of this, however, we first need to examine the things that every application platform supports: applications themselves.
What is an Application?
By definition, an application platform provides services to applications. But what exactly is an application? This isn’t a simple question to answer, and reasonable people can disagree on a precise definition. Still, it’s not hard to illustrate typical application styles, and doing this gives us a good sense of the diversity that an application platform must support today. Figure 1 shows the simplest place to start: a standalone application running on a client computer.
Describing Application Platforms: An Abstract View
Applications come in several different styles, as we’ve just seen, and an application platform should support all of them. This is a tall order: Diverse services are required, and they must be provided in various ways. One way to understand this complexity is first to group together the kinds of services an application platform provides, then look at the different contexts in which those groups of services are provided. Figure 5 illustrates the fundamental service groups of a modern application platform.
Conclusion
Twenty five years ago, application platforms were simple: an IBM mainframe offered CICS while a desktop PC provided a basic operating system. Today, both the hardware and software environments have expanded significantly, and developers have many more options. This requires them to understand a more complex world, but it also lets them create a much broader array of useful applications.